It was after my dad and I got in a tremendous argument. You would have thought World War III went down. I stormed out of the house. As I was leaving, I muttered under my breath, “Don’t expect me to return home, dad."
My face was hot and tears were welling up in my puffy, bright blue eyes. As soon as I hit the road, I took off. Tears were running down my scarlet cheeks, and the sweat was seeping through my new American Eagle shirt. I could feel my legs slowly turning to jelly as I ran down the cragged black road. It seemed as if my heart was seconds from jumping out of my chest, so I decided to take a break and just walk. My stuffy nose turned to goo, and started to run like the Rogue River after a spring snowmelt.
I wasn’t sure where I was going, but I didn’t really care as long as I was far away from my house. My heart had finally slowed down and the sweat had dried up and made my body sticky. I could taste the salt on my chapped, dry lips.
My head was still spinning, and I just wanted to sit down, so I started looking for a place that wasn’t visible from the road. I noticed a very faint path to the right of me. It looked like it had been well used, until recently. The bushes were overgrown, and the dirt and grass had already covered up most of the dropped trash that was left for mother earth to slowly eat. It looked like it led down to the river, so I decided to check it out.
The path was steep and slippery from the loose dirt. The blackberry bushes were clawing at my red, sweaty skin, but I kept pushing through. I could see where the path started to clear, so I stomped my way through the rest of the thick bushes as their thorns tore at my skin.
When I made it through, it took my breath away. There were big clumps of over grown grass that met my knees as I brushed through it. I thought to myself, “This is my place.” I bent down to touch the moonlight colored sand. It trickled in my hand as if it was water.
The path led down to a river spot that was covered in rapids. All you could hear was the splashing of the water hitting the big boulders that block its way down. There was a little path of rocks that led into the blue, green, rough waters. I walked very delicately on the rocks, being careful not to fall in. I reached a big boulder that was large enough for me to sit on, so I decided to stop there. The rapids were splashing up against it, sending little spurts of water up in the air. I could finally breathe, and my anger was slowly melting away.
I sat on the rock for nearly three hours. The freezing air was nipping at my skin, my butt was damp from the moss, and I couldn’t feel my fingers or toes. I knew it was time for me to head home, but I didn’t want to face my dad. Even though my body was calm, I was still furious with him.
After I thought about it for a while, I decided to head home. I walked as slowly as I could, but the sun was setting, the moon was rising, and the temperature was dropping. I knew I needed to speed up, but my knees were threatening to give out at any minute, so I dragged myself along. I was literally freezing, and all I could think about was the warm bed that awaited me as soon as I got home.